Craig Biggio didn't get into the Hall of Fame on his first try, but he'll get in eventually. / Layne Murdoch, Getty Images

by Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY Sports

by Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY Sports

We didn't juice, take steroids or even wash down our double-double cheeseburgers with a six-pack of Red Bull.

But we, members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America, pitched a shutout against the powerful Hall of Fame. Wednesday, for the first time since 1996, not a single player was voted in.

Not home run king Barry Bonds. Not seven-time Cy Young Award winner Roger Clemens. Not 600-home run hitter Sammy Sosa. Not even Craig Biggio, who had more than 3,000 hits and was suspected of nothing more illegal than an overly aggressive take-out slide at second base.

We managed to turn the Hall of Fame weekend in Cooperstown, N.Y., in July into an adult fantasy camp, where you, too, can watch your favorite old-timers because no one new will be joining the exclusive club.

Ridicule and contempt are the knee-jerk responses. Folks are demanding an overhaul to the voting system. A petition is circulating. Players association chief Michael Weiner chastised voters for ignoring Bonds and Clemens.

Go ahead and take all the shots you want; there's absolutely nothing wrong with the results. Shutouts happen, even in today's era of pitch counts. There are no-hitters. Hall of Fame shutouts are rare, but as we've learned about this wonderful game, anything can happen.

"Shutouts are part of the process,'' Hall of Fame President Jeff Idelson told USA TODAY Sports. "It's unfortunate when they happen, but it underscores how seriously the writers take the vote. We believe the process and the rules are right and fair, giving voters the leeway to vote their conscious. It underscores just how difficult it is to be elected and earn a plaque."

No need to condemn the process. It might not be perfect, but it's ours. A candidate has 1½ decades to make the Hall of Fame. And if he doesn't make it on the writers' vote, the veterans' committee can rescue him.

Biggio is not a Hall of Famer this year, but, unless he goes on TV with Oprah Winfrey and Lance Armstrong, he'll be inducted in the next couple of years. Bonds and Clemens, despite links to steroids, one day will be enshrined, too.

It's how the system works. It took Jim Rice 15 years on the ballot to get in. Bert Blyleven received 14.1% of the vote in his second year and was inducted 12 years later. When Robin Yount can amass 3,142 hits, win two American League MVP awards as a shortstop and center fielder and squeak in by 12 votes in 1999, the exclusivity of this club is underscored.

"This idea that this somehow diminishes the Hall or baseball is just ridiculous in my opinion," Commissioner Bud Selig said recently.

Jeff Bagwell, who received the third-highest vote total at 59.6%, called it a travesty that his longtime teammate, Biggio, fell 39 votes shy of induction. Yet a former teammate, Brad Ausmus, understands the waiting game for Cooperstown.

"Nobody getting in isn't a travesty,'' Ausmus told USA TODAY Sports. "This is going to happen. It's the Hall of Fame. The waters get murkier and murkier.''

This year's shutout, if nothing else, sets up the Mardi Gras of Hall of Fame classes in 2014. Greg Maddux, with his 355 victories and four consecutive Cy Young Awards, could receive the highest vote total in history. Slugger Frank Thomas and left-handed pitcher Tom Glavine might get in. And don't forget the expansion era ballot, featuring late New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, Atlanta Braves president John Schuerholz and former managerial greats Bobby Cox, Joe Torre and Tony La Russa.

So let's stop with the dramatics. Everyone chill. The Hall of Fame Museum won't be boarded up and condemned. There's no need to form protest groups in Cooperstown. Relax. Let's see what happens as voters are further enlightened about the steroid era, with perhaps more sinister secrets coming to light.

"To pass judgment on a single election doesn't make sense,'' Idelson says.

Now, if nobody gets in next year, potshots will be deserved. We'll need our own performance-enhancing drugs to recover from that beating.